


A Few Good Men

by newyorktopaloalto



Series: Five to Nine (or Half-Past Two) [1]
Category: The Avengers (Marvel) - All Media Types, The Avengers - Ambiguous Fandom
Genre: Alternate Universe - Politics, Crossovers & Fandom Fusions, DC comics - Freeform, M/M, Multi, Politics, The West Wing - Freeform, Winteriron Bang
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-10-05
Updated: 2016-10-05
Packaged: 2018-08-19 18:19:38
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 15,663
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8220469
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/newyorktopaloalto/pseuds/newyorktopaloalto
Summary: Tony Stark, Deputy Chief of Staff to the President of the United States, navigates the treacherous waters of political agendas, national security, and diplomatic relations on a daily basis. With crises never-ending, and hardball politicians sharpening their knives, it wasn't to his surprise that something was bound to break the fragile balance. A West Wing AU.





	1. Friday Night Garbage

**Author's Note:**

> Every character is owned by either Marvel or DC. Some (minor) plot taken from the TV show the West Wing. 
> 
> I placed the characters in positions that might not seem traditional to canon— the list of which character went where took a long time and based on both their canonical personalities/actions and those from my head canons. If, however, you have any questions/concerns about anything, just let me know. 
> 
> For the WinterIron Bang.
> 
> Absolutely lovely (and spoiler-y) artwork can be found at: 
> 
> http://astromodo.tumblr.com/post/151414287972/my-two-pieces-for-the-winteriron-big-bang-based-on
> 
> and
> 
> http://artingkrusca.tumblr.com/post/151418060908/art-for-a-few-good-men-for-the

##### I.

“Are you, by any chance, out of your godforsaken mind? In what universe could you possibly imagine this would be an acceptable risk to take? I mean, even ignoring the fact that you are up for re-election in two years, this would still blow your chances of having a democratic house majority during midterms— which we are hanging onto by a thread, might I add. Did you not do your internals?” 

“Hi, Clint.” Tony waved, a half-grimace gathering in the creases of his eyes at the other man’s impeccable appearance, before turning briefly to nod at Natalia. 

“Did you or did you not do internals?” 

“It wasn’t me, Clint,” Tony replied, “and I didn’t even know about it.” 

Clint scoffed. 

“I know, I know, but believe it or not it’s true— I was as surprised by this as you were, and by surprised I mean that I got a phone call at 4am and was forcibly awakened by the dulcet tones of ‘not yelling’ from Jean who then proceeded to call me every minute until she was satisfied I was on my way in.” 

“Then who?” 

Tony craned his neck, rubbing absently at it as he looked around the not quite yet bustling office. 

‘Bruce,’ he signed as surreptitiously as possible, ignoring both Clint’s unamused eyebrow raise and Natalia’s muffled snort. 

“Bruce, ‘I actually stay in my lane,’ Banner was the leak? Bruce, ‘no one knows what party I’m affiliated with let alone if I’m part of a party,’ Banner was the HB 4237 leak?”

“Jean and I don’t know for sure— but it makes the most sense.” His eyes narrowed as an intern walked by, and he ushered the duo into his office. 

“If you even think about giving this information to anyone, of course, I will destroy you. I now have the power to actually do so, and I haven’t been able to test it out yet; I’m getting antsy, you know? It’s not like a smear campaign is new to me, or even new to this profession.” 

“Trust me, Anthony, you’re cute enough that I wouldn’t sell you out.” 

Tony swirled around and glanced between the two of them. Clint winked and gave him a jaunty salute. 

“Every time,” he muttered, “every time you flirt with me I have a split second of sheer terror that Natalia is the one doing it.” 

Clint laughed as Natalia finished signing to him and signed a quick ‘no, always me,’ to Tony, who nodded and gestured to shoo them out. 

“Go yell at Bruce for a bit, I have work to do.” 

“What’re you working on?” 

“Oh, you know— stopping World War III, getting six major bills passed through this Senate nightmare, meeting with an ambassador, five senators, and about a dozen House members.” He paused. “And then I’ll probably have an early lunch and get a head start on my afternoon meetings. As you do.” 

“Have fun.” Clint turned as Tony nodded in acknowledgement, and headed to the door, stopping for a moment to sign one last thing. 

“Are you fucking kidding me?!” reverberated through the office door as Tony’s door clicked shut. “Bruce!” 

##### II.

“Why is conceding to the GOP a bad thing in this instance?” 

Virginia Potts raised a brow minutely, an otherwise placid demeanor on her face, fingers still typing away at whatever report she was handling for Stark that was considered beneath his expertise— mostly bills introduced by Richards and Pym, the tag-team of conservatism and thinly-veiled ‘I was bought out by a corporation.’ 

“Because the only thing we have to concede is a bill that will only do good for the future of our country in exchange for one that they can demand at least a dozen riding amendments where we will get nothing done in any capacity, let alone the bill for which we’ve worked our asses off for months for.” 

“We’re five votes down, it’s scheduled for tomorrow, and,” Kitty sighed, glancing to where Bruce’s office was— making sure that he had no need for her before continuing— “honestly? This bill is weak. It’s a weak position; it’s moderate, gives tolerance to who amount to be fascists, and does nothing more than bolster the middle left for re-election chances.” 

“Yes.” 

“Yes?” Kitty narrowed her eyes in confusion. 

“It’s a necessary evil.” 

“I didn’t think working here had a qualification of facilitating necessary evil.” 

“Working here holds all sorts of scrumptious qualifications that blindside you in the worst sort of way; I’d say you get used to it but yesterday I had to console a hysterical NASA office-drone about a literal black hole while on the phone with Isley as she refuses to speak to Tony after the Summers debacle.” 

“Okay.”

“Okay.”

“What about the black hole?” 

Pepper shrugged. “Honestly? I have no clue. Now leave, go threaten Bruce about deadlines and his meeting with the Speaker that most of us are pretending not to know about.” 

“Okay. Lunch?”

“No interns.”

##### III.

“Kurt, get General Danvers in here the second she comes out of the situation room, okay? I need the updated stats by a half an hour ago, so within the next, I don’t know, _now_ , would be helpful.”

“You want me to stand outside the sit room until they finish?”

Sam blinked up at his assistant from the computer in bewilderment. “Was that not clear?” 

Kurt rolled his eyes. “I’ll get an intern to man your lines— try not to maim them if they get a name or two wrong.” 

Sam hummed in acknowledgement, going back to his work with an overzealousness that was at least half fallacious. Five minutes later his door was practically thrown open and Tony started to pace back and forth in front of his desk. 

“Tony—“

“Did you tell him to do it?”

Sam turned his chair to face Tony fully. “I’m sure I don’t know what you mean.” 

“Oh c’mon, Sam, don’t be like this; did you tell Bruce to leak 4237, or did he, for the first time since I’ve known him, make a personal political statement to the press?” 

“Bruce leaked it? How did he not get the internals— I sent him a goddamn memo about it two days ago.” He paused, straightening out his tie. “Well the numbers are probably down now.” 

“You think? This is not great, Sam. Like, this situation will get out of hand, especially with Storm and the,” he groaned and pinched the bridge of his nose, “the fucking minority leader on the warpath. The president’s not going to be happy.” 

“Ororo’s not going to be happy either.” 

“Yeah, and I’m not happy; I’m betting you’re not either.”

Sam gave Tony a withering stare. “He’s my deputy, of course I’m not happy.” He sighed. “I’ll talk to him before Jean can.” 

“And Clint.” 

“Clint. Really?” 

“Just as confused by that one as you, Sam. I suppose even the moderates can surprise you.”

“Apparently.” He leaned back in his chair. “Now get out, I need to think of what I’m going to do with this fiasco.” 

The door closed once more and Sam took a moment to collect himself. 

“Whichever intern is Kurt, get in my office. Now.” 

##### IV.

“Were you aware that an asteroid is on a collision path with the Earth?”

James Barnes’ shoulders twitched as he whirled around, clutching a framed certificate to his chest. 

“General Danvers, sir, you startled me.” He paused, a bemused expression overtaking his former deer in the proverbial headlights. “I did not know that, but I’d hedge my bet on this not being an _ab_ normal occurrence.”

“It’s not, but some NASA guy has been staking out the lobby on his off-time to bemoan it.” 

“I’ll be sure to watch out, sir.” 

He placed the certificate down on his desk, eyeing the general as she leaned against the corner on the other side, his fingers twitching uselessly at his side. 

“Anyone giving you trouble, Commander?” 

“It’s only been ten minutes, sir.”

“Yes, well, this staff doesn’t believe in a grace period, so be on your watch. They’ll wheedle you for more information than you’re allowed to give, so make sure you’re up to date on their clearance levels because they won’t. Also—“ she turned around to face the newcomer to the office, raising a brow as the young man gave her a sardonic smile and tapped his notebook, “they’ll never leave you alone.” 

“Sorry, General, but Sam needs the updated statistics, in basically his words, ’30 minutes ago.’” 

“Of course he does,” she turned to face James once more, “Commander, you know the new stats for MARIGOLD, correct?” 

“Yes, of course.” 

“Commander Barnes will talk to Sam, okay Kurt? He’s my new deputy so he should be ingratiated sooner rather than later.” 

“Yes, thank you, Commander, I need Sam off my ass for, like, two seconds.” 

“Okay, sure, that’s definitely the reason I’m doing this.” 

Kurt gave an exaggerated wink, and motioned for James to follow him. James, for his part, took the silent command in stride and fell in after him, a step behind and to the left. 

“So,” Kurt spoke into the silence, nodding at a couple interns as they passed through the hallways and into the west wing, “Deputy National Security Advisor, pretty cush position, especially for,” he looked James up and down, “what are you 35?” 

“38, and I suppose it is.” 

They walked in silence for a moment, before James cleared his throat. “Who’s Sam?” 

“Communications Director. He was head speechwriter back on the trail—

“Hey, Jessica, Monica, I need the head count for this afternoon and a list of who we can get back—

“And before that he was Communications Director for, uh, Rogers, I think.”

They paused outside of a door, blinds covering the glass windows, and Kurt knocked. 

“Hey, good luck guy,” he stage-whispered, letting out an ‘I got Danvers’ new Deputy, he’ll tell you everything,’ before pushing James in the door and closing it behind him. 

##### V.

“You seen Danvers’ new deputy?” 

“Pepper, I’m sitting here, behind my desk, with a very obvious telephone at my ear balls; is this really the ideal time?” 

“You’re on hold, will be for at least another five minutes— I know because I was the one that patched you through— you have time,” she paused, “so just put it on speaker.” 

“Jesus, fine,” the line beeped as he pressed the speaker button, the phone making a dull thud as it hit the receiver, “Pepper, please, tell me all about Danvers’ new deputy, because I have absolutely nothing better to do with my life right now.” 

“Your sarcasm is noted and ignored, Tony, and you’ll stop your attitude if you want coffee during your afternoon slump.” 

“Fine, Pepper, you win— tell me what you heard through the gossip mongers we in the biz call our assistants, and then please bring me coffee because my slump began the second I walked in this morning.” 

“Okay.” Pepper sat down in the chair and rolled it over to Tony’s side. 

“So his name is James Barnes, he’s a commander and he’s 38. He was taken off active duty a couple of years ago due to an injury of some kind, and this is his first job since. He joined the army at eighteen and served three tours.” 

“Yeah? What’s his sign?” 

“Haha, Tony, he’s cute— Wanda had his file and she shared the basics.” 

Tony opened his mouth and then closed it, reconsidering. 

“Is that ethical?” He chose his words carefully. 

Pepper gave him a bland stare in response. 

“You’re right, Pep, I don’t actually care.

“When you have a chance,” he continued on, “can you get him for me, I need the MARIGOLD stats.” 

“He’s in with Sam right now.” 

“Yeah, well, interestingly enough, I have a higher security clearance than Sam does; I think I might be able to get more out of him, you know?” 

“Don’t harass him on his first day, we don’t want someone else quitting this month because of you.” 

“Pepper—“

“Okay, okay.” 

“And coffee, Pepper.” 

“Fine, okay, yes.” 

##### VI.

“Hi, Bruce.” 

Bruce looked up from his files and gulped. 

“Hi, Jean, what’s up?” 

“Nothing much— you know, press conferences, fielding both reports and reporters, making sure the President, and by extension her staff, look good.” She paused. “Until, you know, _they_ do something to make the office look bad, in which case I have to deal with the situation.

“Especially,” she continued, not letting Bruce put a word in edgewise, “when they leak information to the press without my explicit permission. Or, you know, even their own boss’ permission.”

“Jean—“ 

“You run everything by me, Bruce, everything. I can protect you, I can make sure you don’t tell the press too much, I can have your back if you just talk to me, Bruce. What were you thinking?” 

“We weren’t getting enough support.” 

“Bruce, we,” she let out an aggravated sigh and ran a hand through her hair distractedly, “we got the internals last night and we were three up.” 

“What?” 

“We’re two down now. We lost our moderates, Bruce, and now the fucking minority leader wants his stipulations put in before a floor vote, and public approval went down six and a half percent.” 

“Jean, I didn’t—“

“You need to talk to me about these things, okay?” 

“Okay.” 

“Ororo’s pissed as all hell, she called in a favor with Howlett for this and now we’re all stuck on a sinking ship.” 

She let out a weary laugh. “Hell of a way to pop your bipartisan cherry.” 

“It’s something else,” Bruce agreed, rubbing his hand over his eyes. 

“We’ll get ‘em back— we have more time at least, you know, because of your mess. Well, the staff does, I don’t know if you’ll survive the upcoming storm.” 

Her smile was wry as she imparted one last statement to Bruce’s hunched shoulders: “welcome to the ranks of flawed humanity, Banner; to your left is Stark and to your right is, I don’t know, whatever staffer Nelson is investigating right now.” 

“The smoking weed on property staffer?” 

“See, you fit in so well now.” 

“Thanks.” 

“No problem. Ciao.” 

##### VII.

“Armando, where—?” 

“Yes?” 

Ororo let her question hang in mid-air, pinching the bridge of her nose in lieu of verbalizing her bewilderment of her assistant’s seeming super power of materialization. 

“Where is—?” 

“Pacing the hall, looking like he’s about to face a very, very awkward dinner with his parents.” 

“Specific. Send him in.” 

Armando left and twenty seconds later was replaced by Stark. 

“You’ve been working for five hours today, correct?” 

“Yes.”

“Three of which were spent dealing with Bruce’s utter lack of decorum, a sightly thing to behold for everyone, I assure you.”

Tony’s tone was warier. “Yes.” 

“So why in God’s name did you go on record with the senior white house correspondent?” 

“Uh,” he licked his lips and shrugged, “Damage control. Sorry. I go on record with something quote, unquote ‘leaked’— seeing as we were going to release it with the trash, and bam— news cycle is dominated a story that—“

“—we might not have wanted to tell in five column inches—“

“—but for sure is better than 4237.”

Ororo sighed and shook her head. “I assume Jean is aware of this.” 

“Of course; the last thing I want is Jean out for me, especially today.” 

“Good.

“I need you to go on CNN and debate Richards.” 

“What?”

“You heard me.” 

“I did, I just assumed that I had died and gone to heaven. Debate Richards? Not his chief of staff, or junior member of a committee, or on that one memorable occasion, his _personal_ lawyer? Not even the common decency of his staff lawyer… Richards, himself, on national television— pinch me, Ororo, because I have been granted my three wishes and am currently on cloud nine.” 

“Please don’t mix your idioms.” 

Tony’s eyes squinted open. “Ah, yes, this is Earth, and I am alive— your Princeton condescension is not at all, in fact, heavenly.” 

“I do what I can, Anthony. I do have to wonder though, what sort of heaven has you debating Richards in it.” 

He grinned. “It’s all about diversifying your portfolio.” 

“And leading economists seek to meet with you.” 

“Shocking, truly.”

“Leave, Armando will co-ordinate with Virginia— don’t do anything someone will make you regret.”

“Me? Never. Or do I mean always? I can never remember which—“

“Leave Anthony, I have to prepare for a meeting with Odinson.” 

“Okay, okay. Bye.” 

##### VIII.

“Hi, I’m Virginia Potts— assistant to Tony Stark, deputy chief of staff. It was my understanding that you might need someone to show you the ropes, make sure everyone stays on the up and up. How has your first day been going insofar, all set up?” 

James inhaled to respond, took a moment to actually comprehend the deluge of words and dexterity with which the woman next to him was able to employ with both incredible speed and perfect enunciation. Being used to a certain level of stifling militarism and an entire different set of colloquialisms, the staff of the white house would most likely perplex him for at least another week. 

“Commander James Barnes, I’m sure you’re already aware of me being General Danvers’ new deputy, am I correct?” 

“You are.” 

“Yeah, I’m getting that feeling of living in a fishbowl around this staff.” 

Pepper laughed, her nose scrunching, and nodded. 

“More than you’d know. But honestly, how are you doing? Need help with anything?”  
“I’m doing okay, thank you Ms. Potts, just settling in.” 

“I’m sure.” 

James watched her out of the corner of his eye as she checked her phone, all the while staying in step with his stride and avoiding all barriers in her path. 

“Do you need me for some reason?” he asked as they started down the hallway to his office. 

“Yeah, Tony needs a meeting with you about MARIGOLD stats?” she hung it on a question, shrugging. 

“I just had a meeting with—“

“Sam, yeah. Tony’s clearance is higher, so he can have access to information Sam can’t—

“Bonita, can you get me the top choices for Lambeau’s replacement from Sam? Tony wants to look through them before taking the final three to Ororo—

“— so are you free to meet with Tony at, let’s say 11.30?”

“Yeah, sure.” 

“Good, his office is two from the left from Sam’s. My desk is across the way, just check in with me.” 

“Okay.” 

“Good. Nice to meet you, good luck.”

“You’re the second person—“ his voice went quiet as she walked away “— to tell me that.

“Nice to meet you too.” 

##### IX.

“— and that will be all for now, thank you all for coming to another round of verbally attacking me. Your next chance will be the usual noon briefing where we’ll cover the exciting topics of the state dinner tomorrow, the president’s consistently changing schedule, and whoever we pissed off today,” Jean glanced down at her notes, “looks like the honor goes to— huh, well isn’t that interesting.

“Guess you’ll have to come to my briefing later to find out. Thank you for your time, please don’t harass my staff, just take it directly to me.”

Jean walked out of the press room, turning to her assistant as soon as the door closed. 

“America, please get me Tony, Bruce, and Sam—“

“I’m right here.” Bruce crunched on his apple and leaned against the doorframe. 

“Get me Tony and Sam, my office, now.” 

She gestured for Bruce, who followed her, munching intermittently. 

“Rogers?” she asked, once the door to her office was closed. 

“Senator from New York.” 

“Why is he against Protection and Prevention?” 

“Because he is a conservative democrat who was a cop for a decade before running for public office and now whose most lucrative donations come from police and kin.” 

“You know, I preferred you much more when you didn’t have your own agenda.” 

“I always had an agenda but my job always felt too new, now we’re eighteen months in, so I decided, well, fuck it— we’re here to stay for a bit, maybe we can revolutionize _something_.” 

“How picturesque.” 

“Us commies have always been idealistic.” 

Jean leveled her gaze to Bruce’s, left eye twitching as he stared back at her, nonplussed. 

“I will not respond to that, I better never hear a whisper of that in any media whatsoever, and so help me God, if you have a blog…” she let her threat hang. 

“The constituency shall never know my dark secret, Jean, lips are sealed, key is thrown, so on and so forth.” He took another bite of his apple. “Want a bite? I’ve collectivized it.” 

“I think that’s socialism,” Jean pointed out dryly. 

“See? You’ve already found the humor in your liberal horror.” 

“Can we just? Not talk until Tony and Sam get here.” 

“Sure thing.” 

They stood in the center of the office, silent except for Bruce’s crunching. 

The door opened and they both turned to stare. 

“This is weird, why is this happening? Are you both pod people? Please stop staring at me like I’ve just denounced the government.” 

Bruce snorted at the same time Jean let out a soft, ‘oh my God,’ before motioning for Sam to close the door behind him. 

“Rogers?” she asked. 

“Senator, New York.” 

“Oh my God. Why is he against Protection and Prevention— I know who he is, I’ve spoken to him several times, why do you all do this to me?”

Tony shrugged as Sam scrunched his nose in confusion. 

“I talked to him about it, he said that he’d back it.”

“Well obviously he’s not, and he’s been hinting all morning that he’s not and now I have to deal with him not, at my noon briefing.”

“I’ll talk to him,” Sam promised, shaking his head, “I don’t want to be disappointed in a senator because, you know, they’re mostly bought out, but this is something else. We’ll get him on, Jean.”

“He owes us for 386B last month,” Bruce chimed in. 

“Then we’ll definitely get him.” 

Tony cleared his throat. “I hate to bring it up, but we won’t get him if he’s already been hinting it to press.”

“He won’t want to flip if it will have political rebuff,” Sam agreed after a beat. 

“Which it will— I had two reporters come up to me before my briefing, it’s already on the edges of the wire.”

“Shit.” Bruce took off his glasses to polish them, Sam’s head leant back as he pinched the bridge of his nose, and Tony fidgeted restlessly with a ball point pen. 

“Good day so far.”

##### X.

“Ah, Commander Barnes, come on in and close the door. I’ve heard a surprisingly lot about you, it’s a pleasure.” 

“Tony Stark, I’ve heard minimally about you. The pleasure is mine.” 

“I’m not surprised,” he gestured towards the chair as he sat down, “Pepper likes to surprise people with me, it’s something due to my inarticulable personality, I presume.” 

“I’m sure,” James agreed easily, flipping through his files for little else to do, glancing up at the other man every now and again. 

“So, MARIGOLD, what can you give me?” 

James handed off a copy of the files, Tony snorting every time he came to something redacted out. 

“Can’t even get everything in these files, what is my job even worth?” 

“To be fair, I am 99% sure that you have a higher diplomatic clearance than I do.”

“I do, you are correct, but what, again, is it worth if everything I read is redacted?” he grinned, closing the file with an audible noise that both bemused and impressed James— he hadn’t known file slamming could make a sound louder than a rustle. 

“The redacted is what you can’t give to the public, I hard-copied this for your personal files.“ He paused. “Well, I had an intern copy an already redacted copy that I had previously copied—“

He cleared his throat awkwardly. “I can just tell you what’s redacted if you show me the part you want to know.” 

“Not used to talking a lot?” 

“I’m military.”

Tony grinned, shark-like and vaguely intimidating. “We’ll knock that out of you yet, Commander, and that’s a promise.” 

“I’m holding my breath in anticipation.”

“See? Your comedic deadpan is already on par with Jean, Commander— a true feat if you ask my humble opinion.” 

“I doubt anything about you is humble. Call me James, I hear ‘Commander’ and I have the instinctual urge to salute.”

“Good. I was never even in the military and I have that urge as well.

“Also, call me Tony, especially if you’re going to be divulging top military secrets to me, a mere civilian.” 

“With a four star General diplomatic clearance.” 

Tony waved a hand, opening the file once more with his other and pointing out a section near the beginning of the report. “Semantics. And speaking of—“ 

“You don’t have clearance for that part.” 

“Damn it.” He furrowed his brow. “Carol told you about me, didn’t she?” 

“Not specifically, but she did talk about staffers trying to get more info than they’re cleared for, yes.”

He shrugged, throwing an amused smile towards Tony. “I did my homework.” 

“I’m impressed.” 

“Well shucks, just what I’ve always wanted.” 

“Your expression is absolutely astounding, I just want you to know that.” 

“I practice in the mirror every morning.” 

Tony’s laugh was barking as he flipped through the pages of the file and pointed out another section. “What about this one, military man, am I able to learn its secrets?” 

“That one? Yeah, but you’ll be disappointed— it’s not very exciting.” 

##### XI.

“Senator, you don’t have an appointment, you can’t just barge—“ Pepper exhaled as Tony’s office door opened, appearing behind the irate politician. She stood in the doorframe. 

“Tony, Senator Rogers is here for a meeting.”

“I can see that, and he looks redder than usual. What’s up, Senator? Press conference not go according to plan?” 

“You know it didn’t because your office had everything to do with it.”

“My office? Buddy, I _wish_ it were my office, the decor for one needs to be changed immediately.”

“Stark.”

“Yes, Senator, my office as you so eloquently put it, leaked your decision in a manner that makes it embarrassing now for you, not for the President.” 

“Tony—“

“Don’t ’Tony’ me, Rogers, you made your bed and now you have to reap it.” 

“Your idioms—“

“Are phenomenal, yes, I didn’t have a ton of time for English lit in my lawyerly pursuits, I assure you.

“Now, is there anything other than your ego I can help you with?” 

“Tony—“

“Yes, Steve? I’m calling you Steve now, since we’ve dropped all pretense of professionalism.”

“There were serious misgivings about this bill, especially with Storm’s last minute amendments, and you know that.”

“I don’t know anything of the sort. All we’re talking about here is accountability. Real accountability, where it counts, and where it will do the most good.” 

“You’re saying that we don’t know how to do our jobs!” 

Tony raised an eyebrow. “We?” 

“They, we, it’s all the same, and so is the result. You’re saying that they’re incompetent.” 

“We are saying no such thing. The American people and the statistics, however…” 

“The police are here to protect everyone—“

“If they were protecting everyone, we wouldn’t have needed to put out this bill. If they were protecting everyone there wouldn’t be dead bodies and flimsy excuses. But there are, and they’re not.” 

“I didn’t know you felt that way.”

“You don’t know how I feel about a lot of things, interestingly enough.”

Steve sighed, giving Tony a once over, before licking his lips, deliberating his next words. 

“This isn’t personal, is it?” 

“It wasn’t. Until maybe now, at this very moment. It might be now.” 

“Because I apologized and—“

“It’s not personal and I swear to God if you imply one more time that it is I’ll— I don’t know, but I _am_ able to separate my personal life from my professional one. In this business you have to, being petty can actually only get you so far. You have to ingratiate yourself, be both charming and threatening, and most importantly? Don’t accuse people of enacting policy based on personal vendettas. Because yeah, it happens, but usually not in starkly oppositional ways. 

“Pun unintended.” 

There was a shared silence as they sized one another up, before Steve let out an exasperated breath. 

“Fine. I’ll have my office call yours to figure out a way to get out of this.” 

“Yeah, sure, have fun.” 

“Don’t make this difficult.” 

Tony’s eyes widened as he snapped a grin, nothing but teeth and condescension. 

“I’ll take it under consideration.” 

##### XII.

“Three to go and I think I’ve got Summers.” 

“Wonderful. And we’ll get a couple more Republicans to even it out, perfect.” 

“You’re snippier than usual for, what is it, 12.45?” 

“I’m fine, thank you, Sam, and I’m absolutely ecstatic over this display of bipartisanship.” 

“Okay, sure. So, what’s up?” 

Tony groaned and banged his head against his desk, just once and with a solid ‘thwack.’ 

“Rogers burst into my office about Protection and Prevention.”

“Okay…?”

“He asked me if it was personal.” 

“Is it?” 

Tony’s withering glare made Sam smile a bit. 

“I’m kidding. And if anyone has a problem with letting their personal—“

“I know, but it’s still just—“

“Holier-than-thou?” 

“I was going to go with infuriating or pretentious, but…

“Who after Summers?” 

“Despite her hesitation, I can probably convince Foster. Probably Maximoff and Carter as well.” 

“Get Wanda to talk to her brother.” 

“Despite our— proclivity for nepotism and internal favors, I’d prefer not to abuse it so thoroughly.” 

“Smart. Use their relationship for something bigger, I agree.” 

“Fine, Tony, yes. But on another note, and the real reason I trudged the two doors down is to ask if you wanted lunch. I haven’t gone yet, and Pepper told me you’ve been in meetings all morning so I figured—“

“Yes, food, amazing.” He paused and got a look in his eye that Sam knew couldn’t mean anything good. “We should invite the new guy.”

“Barnes? Sure, but I’m surprised you’re being nice.” 

His previously bemused expression turned into suspicion. “Why are you being nice?” 

“Whatever, he was kinda funny, which I have to encourage in someone because the entire rest of the staff is so stuffy.”

“I’m absolutely sure that is the only reason.” 

“I’m not going to, like, punk him. Is punking even a thing anymore?” 

“I don’t think so, but that wasn’t what I was— never mind. Go and get him, I have to run a couple things to Kurt and I’ll meet you out front in about ten minutes?” He hung the question. 

“Sounds good.”

Tony grabbed his coat and wallet, closing the door behind the both of him. 

“You think he’s cute.” 

“I have absolutely no idea what you mean and I’m suing you for slander.” 

“Okay, go down and get him, and then don’t get that wide-eyed look the entire time we’re out to lunch.” 

“Slander, Wilson, millions of dollars.”


	2. Non-Potable Accounting

##### XIII.

“Okay, children, please take a look at table five and tell me where it went wrong.” 

Bonita, Monica, and Kurt looked down at the arrangement laid out on the table of the Roosevelt room. Tiny placards with names dotted the surface. 

“Tony and Richards.”

“Exactly, America,” Jean paused, “you also forgot the press.” 

They groaned. 

“We’ve been doing this for almost two hours now,” Bonita groused, sighing at the set-up and swiping a hand over the entire thing, “but let’s do it again— hey, uh—“ she snapped her fingers before giving up her thought, and turned to the woman in the corner, “Kamala, right? Can you get us some coffee and pastries?” 

“Sure.” 

“You should be nicer to the interns.” 

“We were all interns once, Jean.” 

“I hired you straight out of college, Bonita, you have no idea what you are talking about.” 

Bonita stuck out her tongue in response, sitting heavily at a chair. “Leave us to this seating hell, thank you, Jean.” 

“Okay. I’ll be in with Tony and Sam if you need me— I’ll check in on you all in about an hour.” 

“Thank you, Jean.” 

Jean waved and left the room, humming to herself and passing by everyone with a pleasant nod and smile. 

“Good day?” 

Jean let out a sharp breath through her nose and glanced around Tony’s office, papers strewn in a more than usual haphazard manner.   
“Insofar.” 

“Okay.” Both Tony and Sam refused to look at her in the eyes. “What would you do if that mood— ummmm, shall we say, plummeted?” 

“Why?” 

“There’s a problem with the nomination.” 

“What problem?” 

“We can’t nominate him.”

“I told you his law review would be a problem. Didn’t I tell you, Tony?”

“You did.” 

“And what did you say?” 

“That it wouldn’t be a problem because Sam and I could make it… not a problem.” 

Jean glanced between the two of them. “Great job at that.

“So who are we thinking of now?” 

“We were thinking Cage. He was on the short list, his track record is consistent, and he’s already a public figure.” 

“Cage is… controversial.” 

“Yes,” Sam agreed easily, “but we can’t have another moderate on the Court unless we want God knows how many years more of indecision and sending half the cases back to the circuit.” 

“Look, it’s a fight for the nomination either way, but for Cage, at least we’re defending good things he did, not bad ones.” 

“Okay, fine, you guys convinced me. You do what you do, I’ll smooth it over with the press after we get the go-ahead from Ororo and the President tonight.” 

“Thanks, Jean. Also, have you heard anything about the Henrietta?” 

“Not yet, but if you wanted to get me that information, that would be amazing, thank you.” 

“That’s not what I was—okay, bye.”

##### XIV.

“I know your secret.” 

“Um?” James looked up from his stack of files and raised a brow at the intruder. 

“You’ve managed to not age a day since you started here, James, and I know how.” 

“Tony, I’ve been here for a month.”

Tony laughed and took the chair on the other side of James’ desk. “Yes, well, you should see a picture of me on my first day of the job compared to one of me a month in.” 

“It can’t have been that drastic.” 

“You’d be surprised.” 

James opened his mouth for a moment, before closing it, rethinking what he was going to say. 

“What do you think my secret is?” he asked instead, shaking off the pink that had settled around his upper cheeks. 

“You’ve located the fountain of youth, now your aging is relegated to a portrait you keep hidden in your— I’m guessing a town house.” 

“Correct on the town house, not so much on your other two— I’ve actually just stolen the soul of every representative.” 

“Good choice, no one’ll notice the difference.” 

James laughed and shook his head. “What can I do you for, Tony?” 

“Right now? What happened with the Henrietta. Later on? Only God knows, but hopefully something involving me getting off work at a decent time and finally taking you to that gyro place.” 

“Yeah, because you’re sure to get off before nine.” 

“You know, I can have hope.”

“You can, but there’s a difference between hope and foolishness. You’re teetering on the latter.”

“Rude.” He paused and considered. “But fair.

“Now, the Henrietta?” 

“You’re going to want to get comfortable for this.” 

“Damn, that bad?”

##### XV.

“So, I heard a rumor.”

“You hear a lot of rumors, Bruce.” 

“I heard a rumor about you.”

“Everyone hears those, and 99% of them are unfounded.” 

“About you and Sam.” 

“Me and Sam? Now that’s one I honestly was never expecting.” Tony licked his lips and let up a silent prayer. “I probably don’t want to know, but what is the rumor about Sam and I?” 

“An aide for McKenzie saw you two,” he rolled his eyes, “and I quote, ‘awfully close together outside of Guigino’s two days ago, and with Stark’s proclivities…’ so he thought he’d warn me.” 

Tony’s eyes closed and his body slumped minutely to the left. A stagnating moment passed before they both started laughing. It took a bit to collect themselves, and while the situation wasn’t all that humorous, the absurdity of it all overwhelmed the pair. 

“It was probably when Jean and I went out into the lounge for that conference call.” 

“Most likely,” Tony agreed, “and any time I’m even sitting next to a man, let alone at a restaurant with one—“

“It becomes a political think piece the next week, yeah. I talked to you first, figured you could tell Sam about it.” 

“Is he still angry with you?” 

“Well, it’s something new, but yeah, I’m going to avoid him until I can smooth it over with Jean. I mean, is it such a bad thing to get lawmakers to discuss mental illness in any capacity other than institutionalization or gun control? Because I don’t think it is, but Sam apparently disagrees.” 

“He doesn’t disagree, he just knows that now the GOP will try to gridlock us on Brayers.”

“What does Brayers have to do with—? The riders.” 

“Yeah. Look, Bruce,” he paused, “and I can’t believe I’m saying this: your passion needs to, jeez, run its course before you… speak.” 

“You’re right,” Bruce replied after a beat, “I can’t believe _you_ , of anyone and everyone who has ever entered into this office, are telling me that.” 

“Yeah, it didn’t— it didn’t come out well.” 

“It came out like a confused mess.” 

“Okay, do you want me to talk to Sam or not?” 

“Yes, thank you, Tony. I owe you one.” 

“Do some of my work so I can leave at a respectable time tonight.” 

Bruce snorted, “Yeah, right. Something reasonable, please.” 

Tony groaned. “I don’t know then; I’ll cash in later.”

##### XVI.

Tony’s stride slowed down as he passed by his office and he furrowed his brow. 

“Where’s Clint?” 

Natalia turned around from where she was leaning against Pepper’s desk and propped her hip on the corner to look up at Tony. 

“At our office, I’m presuming.” 

“Oh. I just assumed, because you’re here. Huh.” 

Pepper sighed and handed off a stack of files to Tony. “Sign these.”

“I’ll read through them, and then I’ll sign them,” Tony amended, placing them under his arm and glancing between the two women. “Plans of world domination?” 

“Lunch plans,” Pepper corrected, standing up from her desk and grabbing her coat. “I’ll be gone for my full hour, Tony, so please don’t call me, asking where I am.” 

“When have I ever done that, Virginia?” 

“Last week.”

Tony paused. “Touché. Have a fun lunch— I’ll have these signed by the time you get back.” 

“If by some miracle, that happens, I’ll get you a twelve pack of red bull.” 

“Natalia, you’re a witness, that is legally binding and I intend to collect.” 

“Were you an actual lawyer at some point, or is your degree faked?” 

“Your wit is devastating.”

“My goal in life.” 

Tony shook his head and smiled, the slightest bit fond. 

“Have fun on your date, you crazy kids. Don’t stay out past curfew, et. cetera, as you will.”

Pepper sighed and walked out into the hallway, Natalia giving Tony a smirking wink as she passed. Tony groaned as they left, hauling the files further up his arm as he trudged to his office. He was intending to collect, but it was going to be a frightfully painful hour in a test of his personal and professional endurance. 

“Hey, Miles, can you copy me these four files?” he asked as he collected them from his briefcase, handing them off to the intern before settling into his desk. 

He went undisturbed for twenty minutes, before a knock had him glancing up. 

“Pamela Isley, what can I do for you? Especially as I thought you were refusing to speak with me.” 

“Virginia is at lunch and honestly, this should go straight to you.” 

Tony let out a breath and looked longingly towards the greatly reduced pile of files he had to sign. 

“What’s happened now?” 

“It’s about the election.” She looked uncomfortable. 

Tony sat up straighter. “We’ve been in office for nineteen months, what about the election?” 

“I’ve heard rumors about who the GOP is going to put forward.” 

“It’s been _nineteen_ months Pamela, why is this happening?” He paused. “Why aren’t you going to Ororo about this?”   
“Because, like I said, it’s just rumors— I don’t particularly wish to go to her with unverified information.” 

“And you think I can verify it?” 

Pamela rolled her eyes. “I know you can.” 

“Who’s the speculation about?” 

“Luther.” 

Both of Tony’s eyebrows raised, then furrowed as he thought about the prospect further. “That is… very smart of them.” 

“It really is.” 

Tony nodded to himself and cracked his knuckles, giving her a rueful smile. 

“I’ll get on it, then, don’t worry.

“This doesn’t really affect you though, so I have to ask why you’re telling me.” 

“It’ll be a difficult road if it’s one against Luther, that’s all.” 

“Ain’t that the truth.”

##### XVII.

“You can’t put Admiral Rhodes next to congressman Maximoff.” 

“Damn it, Jean, why not?” 

“Because Admiral Rhodes is the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff and Pietro Maximoff is a junior congressman from New York.”   
“Well, you’re not wrong.” 

“Thank you, Monica. Kurt? Sam is in dire need of you, so if you could go see what he’s freaking out about that would be great. You two, look at it again— the Belgian Ambassador should not be at the back, I know we’re all exhausted but,” she paused and took off her glasses as a spike of pain went through her head, “we need to just keep trucking through it.

“So I’m going to get ready for this afternoon and—“

“I’m sorry ladies, I need you to stay where you are.”

Two agents swept through the room, one leaving to guard the far side after clearing it. 

“How long is this going to be?” 

“We don’t know, ma’am, we’ll let you know when the area is secure.” 

“Awesome.” Jean turned to the other two women. “So let’s continue working on this 300 attendant dinner, shall we? 

“Thank God the press is out on lunch.”

##### XVIII.

“So…” 

“Does this happen often?” 

“Huh? Oh, it’s happened about— three times now, but including drills, seven.” Tony shrugged and leaned back in his chair, fixing James with an easy grin. “To be fair, I can never tell which is which.” 

James glanced through the window to the agent outside. 

“Drill.” 

Tony twisted his neck to look behind him, eyeing the agent with fervor for a few moments, before turning back around. “Is this one of those things that I’d be able to see as well if I were ‘in the know’?” 

“Yup,” he hopped the ‘p’ at the end, smirk standing strong against Tony’s frown. 

“So,” he continued, “why _did_ you go into politics? You have a law degree.” 

“Yeah, but I have a B.S. in poli-sci so it’s not… that surprising.” He shrugged. “I was at a corporate firm for a couple of years, and then,” he waved his pen around for a few seconds, “I realized I wanted to do something else; I volunteered for a couple campaigns and the rest is history.” 

“What was the first campaign you led?” 

“Walters’ congressional run.” 

“She lost.” 

“She did. I lost the first two campaigns I worked on, but that’s the nature of the game— I chose wild cards so I wasn’t devastated when they didn’t win.” 

James leaned forward and rested his chain against his fist, yawn threatening to break out. Tony’s voice had started to go soft by the end, and it was obvious that without caffeine the office would crash, and soon. 

“I envy those cooped up in the break room right now. Or any room with a coffee pot.” 

“I envy those offices that have the mini fridges.” 

“We should meet in mine from now on,” Tony decided, slapping his own cheeks to perk himself up. 

“Mmhmm. Okay, first campaign you won.”

“Rogers’ first senatorial race.” 

James sat up at that, noticing the slight grimace now etched into Tony’s face. “ _That_ is surprising.” 

“Only to newbies,” Tony teased, waving off any negative emotion he had been wearing before, “it’s one of Washington’s dirty little secrets.” 

“You know, we grew up together.” 

Tony let out a soft laugh and a ‘what?’, shaking his head at James’ nod. 

“We did, swear it on my life. Lost touch for—“ he paused and his tone became reticent, “— a variety of reasons, but… He was a little punk.” 

“Yeah? Now he’s a gigantic son of a bitch.” 

“I’ll take your word for it— I haven’t spoken to him since he started working on the Hill.”

Tony cleared his throat and stood up, reaching around the desk to ruffle James’ hair. “What’s up with this town and sordid histories, huh? Personal secrets becoming national ones and vice versa.” 

“According to every political drama I’ve ever seen—which is an unusually high number, if I’m being honest, and my own experiences actually in Washington, I’d have to hazard a guess and say it’s the nature of the beast. Put this many egomaniacs in one town, throw in press…” James trailed off and shrugged, patting his hair back down and flicking Tony’s hand off his head; the cool polymer of the prosthetic against Tony’s skin caused his eyes to go a little wide— what Sam called his ‘crush’ look, and which he now couldn’t think of any other way. 

Tony sat back down, tapping his fingers against the arm rest absent-mindedly, clearing his throat and trying to hide his minuscule flush from James’ way too accessing eyes. 

“Well, with this going on, I definitely won’t get off at a reasonable hour.” 

“Phrasing,” James shot back, prompting Tony to roll his eyes. 

“Hilarious. Here I was, trying to have a moment, and you ruin it.” 

“Oh, was that what this was? I just thought you were whining, I truly apologize.” 

“I’m sure you do.”

##### XIX.

“An hour and a half.” 

“Yup.” 

“I missed three meetings and two calls.” 

“I missed a press briefing.” 

“I missed out on finishing my work early so I could go to dinner.” 

“Shut up, Tony— you never would, in a million years, have finished your work early.” 

“I might’ve,” Tony countered, pouring more sugar into his coffee than intended, gulping half of it down with a grimace before re-filling it. 

“You wouldn’t have,” Bruce echoed Jean’s statement, pressing the button on the other coffee maker to start it. 

“Whatever. I also missed Richards’ press conference; I was going to make fun of him through the TV screen.” 

“Oh, yeah,” Sam opined, “I was going to as well.” 

“Me too,” Bruce agreed. 

They all stared listlessly at their mugs for a moment, before Jean perked up. 

“The internet will have it.” 

“Yes, the glorious internet.” 

Their gazes turned, once more, to the coffee maker, waiting for the pot to fill before heading into Tony’s office to watch Richards’ press conference. The pot was about halfway full when Pepper walked into the room. 

“Is this what the American people pay you to do all day? Stare at coffee machines?” 

“And make fun of congressmen through the computer, and mankind’s greatest invention: the internet.” 

“Mmmm, no wonder the government gets nothing done.” 

“The government gets nothing done, Pepper, because bureaucracy is a cruel mistress,” Tony rebutted. 

“The government gets nothing done because of you specifically, Tony Stark, so how about you meet with Frost before you laugh at Richards, okay?” 

“Yes, fine, okay. Let me get this cup and I’ll meet her in my office.” 

“Good. And remember your four o’clock, otherwise I’ll have to deal with the onslaught of frantic voicemails and impromptu dropbys.”

“These NASA guys are like freaking clockwork, I can’t believe I have to be the one to deal with them.” 

“It was Ororo’s birthday present to me, didn’t you know?” 

Tony glared at Jean’s shit-eating grin, pouring himself another cup of coffee and whisking away one of the last pastries. 

“I’m going to get you back on Cheese Day, I swear it to you.” 

“Go ahead and try.” 

“Two words,” he reconsidered, “well, a hyphenated word: X-Files.” 

“Like they would tell us if aliens were real,” Jean snapped back, “it’d be a top military secret.”

She paused and her grinned widened as she looked Tony up and down. “Maybe you can convince your man to tell you.” 

Tony sputtered around the sip of coffee he was in the middle of, coughing to get the liquid out of his lungs and arching outward to avoid his mug’s overspill. 

“He is not… my _man_.” 

“Yeah, but you want him to be.” 

Tony drew himself up to his full height, brushing off the front of his shirt to make sure no coffee had stained it. “I have a meeting with Senator Frost, so if you all will excuse me.” 

He exited the room to the dulcet tones of Jean, Sam, and Bruce trying to smother their laughter— not at all a good attempt, and his cheeks reddened as he continued walking.

##### XX.

“Good job last night.”

“Oh, wow, thanks, Ororo,” Tony grinned and shrugged, “but it was definitely a combined effort. It’s not too bad staying up through the night, especially if you have six other people doing it with you. And the regular staff for about half of it.” 

“I’m going around to everyone, don’t worry, but I wanted to thank you personally. You really pulled this one out of thin air, and with me having to deal with the Henrietta— you’ll do okay in my position some day.” 

“Okay, uh, thank you.” 

“I do need to talk to you about something, though.” 

Tony stood up. “Your office?” 

“No, here is fine.” She took a seat and motioned for Tony to do the same. “I heard about Luther.” 

“Isley decide to tell you?’

Ororo smiled and shook her head. “I have my own sources, Tony— I also know everything that happens in this building.” 

“Of course, I shouldn’t keep forgetting.

“But, yeah, I’ve been looking into Luther and what he’s been doing the past couple weeks—”

“Sounds like the build-up to a campaign?” 

“Definitely.” 

A faint tapping started up as she drummed her leg against the carpet, Tony leaning back and staring up at the ceiling. They sat for a while, both mulling over the implications and ramifications of the maneuver. It wasn’t unprecedented by any means, but it was still most assuredly a hit to the administration. 

“We’re nineteen months in,” Tony stated. 

“We are.” 

“We shouldn’t have to deal with the fucking re-election until next year.” 

“Yes. But here we are, and now we have to make a plan.” 

“What do you mean?” 

“The President can’t know, the rest of the staff can’t know. It’s you and me, Tony, until we can get a better handle of what this will take. Splitting resources this early, what concessions to make, and who to make friends with; it was hell the first time and now we have to start again, while in office.” 

“Nineteen months in.” 

“Nineteen months in.” 

They looked at each other. “We’re going to re-elect the President of the United States.”

##### XXI.

“I think we did it.”

“Really?” 

“Really. Every placement is rational and considering, it’s completely balanced, and we finally remembered every Ambassador coming.” 

“So, I can go and finish my work?” 

“I think, Monica, we can all go and finish our work.” 

Bonita placed a hand to her heart as Kurt sighed in relief. 

“Let’s call this done, then, gang,” Jean grinned, re-tying up her hair. 

A cough from the other side of the table interrupted her, and she turned to look at Sam. 

“Yes, Samuel, how may I be of service?” 

“We have a meeting…” he trailed off, looking closer at the placards, “Um…”

“What?” 

“You missed someone.” 

There was a groan from everyone and Jean darted her eyes frantically. “Who?” 

“Look towards the front.” 

A beat passed. 

“Okay,” Jean sighed out wryly, “you know who we forgot? We forgot the President.

“Now, start over, and I’ll be back soon.” 

She walked out with Sam and banged her head against the files she was carrying. Sam just laughed at her and let her into his office, closing the door behind them. 

“So, there may be a press problem tomorrow. I don’t know for sure, but there’s GOP aides sniffing around it and soon their bosses will get a hold of it.” 

“What type of press problem?” 

“An aide for McKenzie saw Tony and I,” he air-quoted the next part, “awfully close together at Guigino’s.” 

“And even though it’s just their word—“ 

“—something, more than likely, will be made out of it.” 

“Of course. Fucking Republicans.” 

“Let’s hope none of us are doing that,” Sam teased. 

A pause “Disgusting, just the image I needed. Thanks for telling me, I’ll make sure to bury the lead tomorrow. No offense, but now is not the time for another ‘scandal’ from this office, as I’m sure you are aware.” 

“Funnily enough, Jean, I can’t control everything Bruce does. He’s given autonomy for a reason, and it’s good, a majority of the time. It’s the nature of this job— you win some, you lose some.” 

“Bruce has been losing more than winning lately.” 

“Sophomore slump.” 

“Or something. Anyways, I’ll talk to you later, I have to go make sure they don’t forget to place the VP this time.” 

“Smart move. I’ll stop by your office with some food later.” 

“You are a godsend, Sam, thank you.” 

“I try my best.”

##### XXII.

“It was a live-traning exercise and someone didn’t check to see if the loaded rounds were switched out with blank ones and the Henrietta fired live rounds into the Margaret Hamilton.” 

Jean blinked and raised her brows at Tony. “Well that’s a colossal fuck-up.”

“It really, really is. But that’s not the end of it, Jean.” 

“Oh God, it’s not?” 

“No, no, it gets better. So the Captain of the Margaret Hamilton checks for damages, finds them minimal, gets on the radio with the Henrietta— and you need to know that these two guys have a serious beef with one another for some reason dating back at least twenty years, so this is grudge-filled and extremely personal— says, ‘prepare for combat,’ or something, and tells his men, still on radio with the Henrietta, to reload their weaponry with live rounds.” 

“Why are you laughing? That’s horrifying.” 

“I know, that’s why I am. Our military is an imperialistic joke.” 

Jean stopped her burgeoning laughter. “Have you been speaking with Bruce lately?”

“I speak to Bruce everyday, why?” 

“No reason.” She paused. “Also, does Commander Barnes know your feelings about the military?” 

Tony let out a sharp breath. “Not that it’s any of your business, but yes, he does. And sometimes I think he agrees with me, which is saying something.” 

“He finds you charming.” 

“He does not. Now, do you want to hear what happened after the crew loaded in the live rounds, or not?” 

“I honestly don’t know. Like, for my own peace of mind, I don’t, but I know that I have to.” 

“So, the Margaret Hamilton fires, glancing blow because they chose that day to not have a body count, which I guess, small mercies? It took another half of an hour before the base realizes that they’re not firing blanks at each other, they intervene, and the two commanding officers are given a stern talking to.” 

“A stern talking to?” 

“Yes.” 

“They’re not getting court-martialed?” 

“No.” 

“So who found out?”

“Editor from the Miami Herald was on base for a couple of profile pieces.” 

“Jesus Christ on a cracker.”

“Yeah. So as press secretary, I thought you should, you know, know.”

Jean hissed out a breath through her teeth and gave a grimaced smile in Tony’s direction. 

“Thank you, Tony. I’ll make sure it’s taken care of.” 

“Yeah.” 

He walked out of her office, before turning back in. “I’ll just be, in my office, if you need anything.” 

“Okay, thanks.” 

“No problem.”

##### XXIII.

James cleared his throat, rapping on the doorframe to Tony’s office, a paper bag clenched in his hand as he waved it around a little awkwardly. Tony’s expression went bemused and he motioned for James to come inside. James, for his part, decided to stand awkwardly in the middle of the room and not say anything. 

“What’s up?” 

“I brought you dinner. From the gyro place.” Tony’s eyes went a little wide. “I talked to Virginia, and she said you haven’t eaten, and I had just finished my work, so… 

“I thought I’d bring food here, since you’re not done yet.” 

He shrugged and set the bag on Tony’s desk, taking a seat and, apparently getting over whatever nervous energy had possessed him before, started distributing the food between two plates.

“You brought me dinner.” 

“I did.” 

The bridge of Tony’s nose and top of his cheeks reddened, his eyes still wide. “Wow. Okay.” 

James looked up, shoving a plate towards where Tony was now seemingly frozen. “Is this odd for you?” 

“I mean, it’s different.”

James unwrapped his gyro and took a bite. “Why?” 

“Coming back into this building after you’re done for the day?” he unwrapped his own, “Willingly? True test of character right there, Barnes.” He started eating his own. 

“Thanks,” he managed in between bites, his previously forgotten hunger now making itself known. 

“You’re right, that’s the best gyro I’ve had in years,” James stated, after they had finished eating. 

“It’s heavenly,” Tony agreed, draining the last of his red bull and then missing the recycling can by mere centimeters. 

“Hey,” he changed subjects abruptly, “and it’s fine if you don’t want to tell me, but I have a question.” 

“What is it?” James asked, tossing his soda can neatly into the can and smirking at Tony’s incredulous sputtering. Tony’s expression went cautiously serious once more. 

“Why’d you join the military?” 

James let out a loud exhale, honestly not expecting that question. He thought for a few moments, Tony’s nervous fidgeting increasing in tempo the longer they sat in silence. 

“I’m sorry, you don’t have to—“

“I wanted to help people.” 

Tony shut up and let James continue speaking. 

“They said I could explore the world, promote democracy, and help people in need.” He paused. “They also said they could pay for college, which, for a low-income family with three kids is a life-saver. I’d be on the officer track, which meant a steady income and a fast-track to a high-ranking position. I was seventeen and whenever they spoke to me it felt, I don’t know, important.” 

“Did you help people?” 

“I helped my family then,” he gave Tony a long look, “Now, with this job, I like to think I’m helping a lot more.” 

He licked his lips and shrugged, offering Tony a weak smile. “There’s a lot of blood on my hands that I’d like to atone for.” 

“Vive memor leti.” 

“I’m sorry?” 

“Live remembering death.” Tony gave James a small smile. “That’s what I do, every day. You come here in the morning, remember where you are, the position of power that you have, and you try to live remembering death. What came before, what will come, and what you can do about it. Have that on your mind, and your decisions should be pretty just.” 

James’ smile turned real, still mostly resigned, but he nodded. “You astound me.” 

“Please,” Tony denied, waving his hand, “if we’re going by amazingness, you know full well that you would take the cake, the silver and the bronze.” 

James blushed and ran his hand across the back of his neck. “Well, ain’t you just something else. You keep flattering me, and you have to pay for dinner next time.” 

Tony grinned. “Deal. Where do you wanna go? Nowhere terribly fancy, because I live on the budget of a public servant, which, despite many misconceptions, does not pay all that well.” 

“Yeah, it’s all the palm greasing that really gets you the bucks in politics.” 

“If only I were a politician, I’d be loaded.” 

“Or you stayed with law.” 

“White collar lawyering is soul-sucking, I promise you that.” 

“Good thing I don’t work at a corporate firm, I’d have competition.” 

Tony laughed, James joining in after a moment. 

“Tony—“

“Hey, Bruce, what’s up?” he laughed out, his humor dampening quickly as he saw the look on Bruce’s face. “What’s wrong?” 

“Put on CNN.” 

Tony scrambled to do so, taking the television off of mute as the three men stared at the screen. Tony’s breath caught as the story unfolded around the overwhelmed reporter, and he felt his throat tighten. He clenched his hand around the edge of his desk, knuckles turning white to keep himself upright. James’ hand landed on top of his own, turning his arm so he could grip onto that instead of the wood. The pinpricks of pain from where James was holding onto Tony’s hand grounded him and his throat unconstricted slightly. 

“We need to— I need to wake the president. Bruce, call Ororo and Sam, get them down here ASAP. I’ll make sure Jean is aware of the situation, I think she’s still in her office.” 

He turned to James, whose features seemed hazy in the glare of the television lights and sound. “If I were you, I’d leave before it becomes a headless chicken and someone needs you for something.” 

James, about to reply, was stopped by a call to his phone. “It’s General Danvers, I think you were too late with your advice.” 

He answered and had a brief conversation, Tony and Bruce on their own phones as they all kept half an eye on the scene playing out in front of them.


	3. Two-Thirds of 50%

##### XXIV.

“Tony, wake up.” 

“Time-zzt?” he asked as his head popped up from the surface of his desk. “What happened?” 

“It’s five in the morning. No news— emergency workers are still on scene and I don’t have the clearance to know anything about what the FBI’s doing. I got you caffeine, power pars, and a spare suit.” 

“Pepper, you are an angel.” He looked over her carefully. “How are you doing? Have you gotten ahold of your family?” 

“I managed to, yeah. They’re all fine— they were at home, thank goodness. Thank you for giving me the time to.” 

He waved her thanks off. “There wasn’t anything you could have done here, Pep, I was just fielding calls most of the night and waiting for news like everyone else. Besides, this way you were able to get everything needed to make me look like a human again.” 

“You’d need a lot more makeup than you’d know what to do with.” 

The brief return to normalcy gave them the respite needed to decompress. 

“What’s the count?” 

“72 dead, 31 injured, and 119 missing.” 

“Jesus Christ.” 

“Yeah.” 

They took another moment and watched the two set up television screens. 

“You need to get ready, Ororo’s holding a meeting in a half an hour, she told me to wake you.” 

“Yeah, okay, sure.” He nodded and took the proffered items from Pepper’s arms. After setting them down, he grabbed onto her arm and pulled her into his chest, sagging the slightest bit as they held onto one another. “It’ll be fine.” 

“I know.” 

“We’ll get through this.” 

“We always do.”

##### XXV.

“Here, drink this.” Tony dropped off an extra can of the energy drinks Pepper had gotten for him. “Better than any coffee we could ever have in this place and it won’t give you the runs.” 

“Thanks.” Bruce saluted him with the can, finishing off his coffee regardless, before popping the top and guzzling about half it it down. He took a long pull from his cigarette after, grimacing. “I hate how energy drinks taste.” 

They stood in silence for a moment, before Bruce reached into his coat pocket and offered Tony one of his smokes. 

“You look like you could use it.” 

Tony sighed gratefully, plucking one from the pack and lighting it. He slumped against the wall, rubbing at his eyes tiredly. “Thanks.” He took another drag. “God, it’s been awhile.” 

Bruce let out a strained chuckle. “You should have seen Jean a couple of hours ago, it was like she was trying to become a chimney.” 

Tony snorted, flicking his ash into the tray below him and taking another drink. 

“Have you heard anything new?” 

“Since the meeting with Ororo? Not really. There’s a manhunt, but I don’t know any details.” 

“I heard the President is going to go up to San Francisco.” 

“Yeah,” Tony nodded, “I’ll probably end up staying here and everyone else is going to make a quick trip. At least you can sleep on the plane there and back, so, you know, small miracles.” 

“It’s something,” Bruce agreed, stubbing out his cigarette and giving Tony a pat on the shoulder. “I’ll talk to Sam— see if there’s something I can do for you before leaving.” 

“Thanks, Bruce,” Tony sighed out, catching the other man’s hand, squeezing it tightly and letting go. “You’re a good man.” 

“I try,” Bruce responded, tossing Tony the rest of his pack of smokes. “Take these, I have another pack in my office.” 

“A good man,” Tony espoused once more. 

“I’ll talk to you before we leave.”

“Okay.” 

Bruce left Tony to his own thoughts. Tony, for his part, tried to blank out his mind, or meditate, or something that would stop him from obsessing over the situation they were all attempting to deal with and control. He rubbed at his eyes again, letting out a frustrated half-scream as the action produced nothing more than white spots to bounce around his vision for a moment. He took the last drag off of his smoke, stubbing it out after lighting a new one with the butt of the last. 

“This is fucked,” he sighed to himself. 

“That is one way to put it, Anthony” 

Tony opened his eyes and straightened up. “Madam President, I didn’t expect—“ he stopped himself, looking down at his hands, wondering what to put down to make him look less like a fumbling businessman. 

“Don’t worry about it, I have seen you worse, and you have seen me worse.” 

“Of course, Madam President.” 

“I’d also like one from your pack, if it’s not too much trouble, Anthony.” 

“Of course not, ma’am.” He offered a cigarette and lighter to her. “Though I have to say that the press will have a field day is they saw this.” 

“Good thing they’re not looking. I’ve quit, mostly, but stressful times call for stress-relieving measures.” 

“Isn’t that the truth.

“Madam President?” 

“Yes?” 

“Do we have to worry about,” he considered what he wanted to say, “another one of these situations?” 

Diana Prince looked down at him and sighed. “I truly do not know. Admiral Rhodes assures me not, General Danvers says not to be surprised if another incident takes places before we can apprehend everybody involved, and Director van Dyne is fence-sitting.” 

“Oh.” 

Diana smiled over at him. “This job isn’t knowing everything all of the time. You wait for others to do their jobs, review everything given to you, and then make the best decision that you can while never knowing if you have everything, if something will go wrong or not according to plan; it’s doing the best you can with what you have.” 

“You have a fair amount more knowledge than the average constituent, ma’am,” Tony pointed out. 

“You are correct,” the President conceded, “now run along and do what you need to with the rest of the staff before I whisk them all away to San Francisco and leave you here.” 

“I never get to go on the field trips.” 

“Behave and next time you might be able to.” 

“Yes, ma’am.” He stood from the wall and rolled his shoulders back. “Be careful out there, ma’am.”

She nodded. 

“Thank you, madam President,” he nodded, walking away after that statement, feeling better after gaining the knowledge that not every answer had to be known. If the President could admit to him that she didn’t have all the answers, he could do the same with people other than his colleagues and Pepper.

##### XXVI.

“You’re going to have to do the briefings today; are you capable of that, Tony?” 

“I’ve done briefings.” 

“You did one, when I had pneumonia, and it wasn’t great.” 

“It was fine.” 

“You mocked them and then heavily implied that the president was taking secret meetings with Ambassador T’Challa to re-negotiate diplomatic relations between the US and Wakanda.”

“Well, they were.” 

“But you don’t tell the press that, Tony.” 

“Which is something I now know.” He looked Jean up and down, noticing her disheveled countenance. 

“Don’t worry, Jean, I won’t let the press run free with this one. Now, get on that plane and take a nap, huh?” 

“Half of the corps is going with me, so you don’t have to worry about a full house today.” 

“Thank you, Jean. I’ll coordinate with you whenever I get more information, and I do also expect you to keep me in the loop.” 

“Like I’ll ever let the press have a question you don’t have a definitive answer to, that never goes well.” 

He smiled briefly and reached out to squeeze her shoulder. She nodded to him, patting his hand as she called out to America to pick her up a fresh suit, ‘as soon as you can haul ass to my place and back, take-off is in forty-five minutes.’ 

“Bye, Tony, and good luck.” 

“You too, Jean.”

##### XXVII.

“So, what _do_ you know about the bombers?” 

“That is a very good question, Jubilation, and I can tell you this: the bombers were part of a sect of white nationalists; they posted a manifesto a few blocks away from the scene, which you will all have access to once the FBI clears it. 

“I’ll take a couple more questions before turning the microphone over to Director van Dyne, who will be more than happy to answer any specifics she’s able to release.

“Yes, Peter?” he gave the young man a surprised look, “I’m surprised to see you here.”

“My editor’s with Jean, but she wanted someone in office. 

“How has the response from FEMA been?” 

“FEMA has been on scene since three A.M. PST. They’re working closely with the Red Cross and local agencies and reporting every two hours to Washington.” 

“Is this scrutinization due to previous disasters where FEMA and the administration were questioned about both their response time and political agendas, which impeded efficiency and level of care?” 

“This administration has thoroughly reviewed every agency it governs and has implemented new strategy across the board, FEMA is not the only agency we keep a close eye on. 

“Betty, what can I do for you?” 

“Senator Rogers has gone on record about the bombings in California last night saying, and I quote: ‘While this is no doubt a tragedy, and everyone who has been affected is in my prayers tonight, I feel as though it is my duty to admonish the White House, whose passing of SB 3212, the so-called ‘Protection and Prevention’ Act last month has done nothing more than exacerbate the tragedy in San Francisco last night…’ There’s more.” 

“That’s fine, Betty, I can conceive the rest.”

He paused and twisted his tongue up against his teeth, clearing his throat before leaning into the podium and lowering his tone. 

“Senator Rogers is using a national tragedy, a domestic terrorist attack, to further his own political agenda. He was a police officer for a decade, and you don’t just leave the Blue Code of Silence after you’re not on payroll anymore. He had a personal and political problem with Protection and Prevention, and to say that not establishing the act—which has has saved lives and will continue to save more— would have somehow stopped neo nazis from blowing up three square blocks of low-income, largely minority residencies in San Francisco is absurd. If a politician ever touts policy not directly related to punishing the domestic terrorists, if they ever pretense empathy towards people they are known to hate, it is for nothing more than using others’ pain to further their own careers. They do not care, and I assure you all that Senator Rogers is doing no such praying tonight.

“Thank you, I’ll call a briefing when we have more information available. Director van Dyne is here to answer any questions regarding specifics of the scene.”

##### XXVIII.

“I saw your briefing.” 

Tony looked up from where his head was pillowed on his arms. James took the seat from across the desk and moved it over so it was next to Tony’s own, sitting down and nudging a five hour energy bottle towards Tony’s sprawled form. 

“Yeah?” he asked, chugging the bottle down, “What did you think? I liked the end part where I couldn’t keep my damn mouth shut because I was seething.” 

“I liked that part too, funny enough.” 

Tony groaned and grabbed at his hair. “I told Jean I wouldn’t fuck up.” 

“It was brave.” Tony turned towards James and gave him a skeptical expression. “It was. It was honest, and it was everything that needed to be said by someone who works for the people but no one ever has.”

“People need to know that their frustrations and disappointments are understood,” Tony agreed. 

“They do. And I think saying all of that was very vox populi.”

“Did you look that up because of, God that was last night, wasn’t it?— last night.” 

“Nah, it’s just one of, like, three latin phrases I actually know.” 

Tony gave a weak chuckle and looked at James further, his brow furrowing as he started to pout. “You look like you actually rested.” 

“I did. Unlike you, I’m able to sleep for five hours and have someone else take care of my job.” 

“Lucky.”

James hummed in agreement and proceeded to take Tony’s right hand into his, massaging out the fingers where they were starting to give out cramped twitches. 

“Is there anymore news on the group responsible?” 

“They’re threatening to further their actions across the country until their demands of a ‘true America’ are heard.” 

“Jesus.” 

“Ororo is in the sit room along with General Danvers— they were called in about fifteen minutes ago, so I’m assuming something has changed since the last information I’ve received. I’m probably going to be called in soon as well, but I wanted to see how you were doing before starting to loiter in the hallway.”

“How sweet.” 

James shrugged and gave Tony a lopsided grin. “Only to people I like.” 

He let Tony’s hand go and stood up, brushing down his slacks to get the wrinkles out. He hesitated a moment, before leaning down and placing a light kiss against Tony’s temple. 

“No matter what anyone else says, I think you did good. We’ll lunch later, okay?” 

“Okay, great,” Tony agreed, a little bit faint— though that might have been from the half metric ton of caffeine and lack of sleep. 

“Okay.”

##### XXIX.

“Eat a power bar.” 

“Pepper, I just did.” 

“Eat another one, Tony, I’m sure you ate one an hour ago and then proceeded to drink a shit ton more caffeine.” 

“Yeah.” He unwrapped a bar and offered another one towards his assistant. She took it and started munching on one end, focusing her gaze onto Tony until he took the hint and actually took a bit of his own. 

“How bad is it?” 

“It’s not great,” he sighed, before taking his words back, “of course, it depends on whether you mean the bombings or my descent into not having a brain-to-mouth filter.” He paused. “Actually, they’re both not great, so the answer still applies.” 

“Don’t be flippant, Tony, this is not the day.” 

He took a sharp breath in before deflating suddenly, teeth clicking together on words he was about to spout. “You’re right, I’m sorry. Just— it’s been—“

“A very bad situation all around, you’re right. But you have to remember that you’re not the only one dealing with this. Use the help you have, hmmm?” 

“Everyone’s running ragged, but I will endeavor not to take on everything myself, yes?” 

“Good, that’s all I ask.

“And Tony?”

“Yeah?” 

“Remember to breathe.” 

“That’s no fun, Pep. Crushing stress and no reprieve makes Tony a fun boy.” 

“That is not it at all.” 

“Shush. I’m actually going to take a power nap, now, okay?” 

“Good. Get some rest, I’ll make sure nothing bothers you for twenty minutes.” 

“Thank you, Pepper. And after I’m done, you should use my office for the same, if you need to.” 

“I will. Now sleep.” 

She closed the door behind her, leaning against it for a moment before heading to her desk. 

“Hey, I brought you some food.” 

She smiled and reached out for the bag, kissing the other woman on the cheek as she did so. 

“Thank you, Natalia. By the way, I am sorry to have run out at four in the morning.” 

“Do not worry about it, my dear, I understand having a boss that works on a political schedule. I was sad to see you go, but if you would like, you can make up for it by coming over again tonight.” 

“Count on it,” Pepper promised, practically drooling as she took a whiff of the food from inside of the bag. “This looks amazing.” 

“I made it.” 

Pepper grinned and sat down, starting to eat ravenously. 

“It’s delicious, thank you.” 

“You are welcome. I need to go to my office, Clint has a meeting in an hour, but I wanted to bring you something before I did.”

“You are the absolute best woman I have ever had the pleasure of meeting.” 

“I should hope so,” Natalia teased, leaning down to steal a bite of Pepper’s food. 

“How are you doing?” she asked when she finished chewing. “I know you have family in San Francisco.” 

“They’re all fine, they were on the other side of the city. They heard it, but weren’t affected.” 

“Good. But how are _you_ doing?” 

“I’m fine. I’m okay. Shaken up, especially with everything going around in the office. It’s disarming, but I’ll power through it.”

“Okay. I have to go now— I love you.” 

Pepper smiled and leaned up to kiss Natalia. “You too. See you later.”

##### XXX.

“I’m not calling to yell.” 

Tony sighed into the receiver gratefully. “Good, because I could not handle that right now.” 

“Did I wake you?” 

Tony looked at his watch, grimacing when he realized that only five minutes had passed since he had attempted to go to sleep. “Yeah, but it’s fine. What’s up, Jean?” 

“Everyone up here got ahold of your quote.” 

“I’m not surprised— cell service shouldn’t be allowed on Air Force One.”

“I agree, but that’s neither here nor there at the moment. I’m wondering what happened in the sit room? The president’s been on the phone with Ororo for forty-five minutes now and hasn’t let anybody in.” 

“I don’t know, they’re all still in the sit room— they must be conferencing from there.” 

There was silence on the other end of the line as Jean contemplated his words. “Is that good or bad?” 

“It could be either,” Tony shrugged, adding an ‘I don’t know’ as he realized Jean couldn’t actually see his action. 

“What do you think?” 

Tony went over the conversations he had that day in his head and reviewed them for any glean of information he could gather from the strands— trying to guess at a puzzle still missing half of its pieces. 

He sighed heavily. “I honestly have no clue, Jean.” 

“Okay.” 

She sighed as well, the sound coming out as static on his end. After a moment she laughed. 

“If what you said didn’t inevitably cause such a shit storm, I would be cheering you on.” 

He grinned. “You don’t know how refreshing that is to hear.” 

“But you still promised that you wouldn’t fuck up.” 

He grin slipped. “I’m sorry. I just—“

“I know, it’ll be fine.” She cleared her throat. 

“I don’t know what it’s going to be like when we get there.” 

“Yeah. How much longer on the flight?” 

“About two and a half hours. We’re landing in SFO and then heading straight for ground zero. She’s going to the hospitals where they took the wounded and will talk to some of the families of the dead. We’re still debating over whether or not she should make the speech there, or wait until she gets back to the Oval.” 

“What does Sam say?”

“He and Bruce believe we should wait. Have the seal behind her and show it’s a national horror.” 

“You?” 

“I think she should show it’s not a national horror, it’s a very specifically targeted horror that we don’t do enough to protect people from. I want her to be in San Francisco, showing who this was done to and why, and why we need to be better in making sure we send a message to denounce and vilify the fascists who believe they can hide beneath their smiles and ‘respectability’. This cannot be tolerated, and will not be. That’s what she needs to do, and it can only be done in the city.” 

“Then tell them that. Because, Jean? You are absolutely right.” 

“Good.” 

“Is that why you called?” 

“I wanted to run it by you before taking it to the president. I figured, since we’ve been doing gutsy recently, I’d better get on the bandwagon before it leaves.” 

“Also, Jean?” 

“Yeah?” 

“You’ve been talking to Bruce, haven’t you?” 

“He’s makes very excellent points a majority of the time.” 

“He really does.

“Good luck out there, I forgot to tell you that before you left.” 

“Thanks.”

##### XXXI.

“Hey, Senator Rogers is doing a press conference tonight.” 

Tony looked up at Betty, who was shifting, slightly uncomfortable, in his doorway. 

“What do you mean?” 

She breezed through the room, dropping into the chair and darting her gaze around the office briefly, before settling on him. 

“He’s called a press conference. Made it sound like it’s something big— ‘shouldn’t miss this’ is what his chief of staff said to me. I don’t think it’s just going to be a rebuke of your speech earlier, I think he has something.” 

She cleared her throat and the looked towards the doorway. 

“Look, I shouldn’t be telling you this, probably, but I’ve asked around and it seems like no one knows what’s going to happen. So if there’s anything big about one of the staffers, or the office itself, that the Senator might know— you might want to nip it in the bud.” 

Tony, for a terrifying moment, had a bolt of lightening hit him as he remembered a definite big thing that could be used against him, to which Rogers had definite information on. But no, that would be a last resort move, and a move Steve would only make if wanted an end to his own political career. But other than that—

“I cannot honestly think of a single thing, Betty.” 

She gave him a wry smile and stood up. “Like you would tell me if you did.” 

“If I needed a leak, I would. And I will, the next time we need something.” 

“I’m holding you to that, Tony.” 

“I’ll be sure to inform Jean.

“Thank you, Betty, I appreciate it.” 

“Yeah, I wouldn’t have told you, but I don’t like the Senator very much, so…” 

She shrugged and waved at him, looking both directions in the hallway before leaving. 

Tony, meanwhile, started pacing his office after the door closed behind her. This was not good, This was not good, and he didn’t even know why it wasn’t. He stopped halfway through a step, tripping over nothing for a moment before righting himself. This next part would not be fun, but it would be necessary. 

“Pepper!” he called out, opening the door and giving her a grimace. “Can you set up a meeting with Senator Rogers for today?” 

“I guess,” Pepper responded, giving him an odd look, “what time?” 

“As soon as he can. But don’t put it that way, put it, you know, less desperate.” 

“Sure.” 

“Thank you.”

“Is something wrong?” she asked, following him back into his office. 

“I hope not, but there probably is.” He pinched the bridge of his nose. 

“I’ll get you some aspirin and a bagel.” 

“Thank you. But call Rogers first, okay?” 

“Okay, sure. And, like, if you need a sounding board—“

“I’ll get you, of course.”

##### XXXII.

“Ms. Munroe is on a call with the president, but she wanted you to have an update, so she sent me to talk you through what’s happened.” 

“Lay it on me, James, and please tell me there’s some good news.” 

James smiled and took the motioned for seat. “It’s pretty much all good news.” 

Tony perked up and gave toothy grin back. “Really?” 

“Really. The FBI located their safe house and completed a successful extraction, minimal casualties.”

“How many is minimal?” 

“Three of the men, excuse the flattering terminology, decided they would rather die than face trial. The ones that were arrested pledged allegiance to the white power ‘movement’ as they were being hauled away.” 

“It’s just one sect though. And there were threats of more to come,” Tony pointed out, relaxing minutely in his chair. 

“They weren’t too terribly careful at keeping their rosters hidden— no one can technically be arrested for being on a list, and the FBI cryptologists are working on it as we speak. The one good thing bout this type of bombing, if anything can be said, is that it takes a lot of resources and a lot of time. It’s unlikely that there will be time to implement another attack before the FBI is on their case.” 

“Can I tell the press all of that?” 

“You can tell the press what’s in this file,” he handed it over, “we’re waiting for a bit, letting some things settle, before releasing names and whatnot.” 

“Okay.” 

“How are you doing? You look like you’re trapped in a corner.” 

Tony let out a heavy sigh and shook his head wearily. “I’m hoping that I won’t be, is all. There’s an issue— concerning what I said at the last press briefing.” 

James nodded and stood up, motioning for Tony to do the same. “It’s almost lunch time, let’s go to the cafeteria. Get some food in you.” 

“Mother hen,” Tony teased. 

“Like you would have remembered to eat if I hadn’t said something,” James chided fondly, taking Tony’s arm and leading him out the door. 

“Senator Rogers is here for your meeting,” Pepper called out from her desk, and Tony twisted straight into Rogers’ side as he turned to face her. 

“Stark, why did you want to— Bucky?” 

“Oh, hey Steve.” The only sign of discomfort was a tighter grip on Tony’s arm from where James was clenching down. 

“What are you doing here?” 

“I’m the Deputy National Security Advisor, so, you know, my office is down the hall and to the left.” 

“For how long?” Steve looked confused and slightly betrayed. 

“About a month now.

“We’ll have lunch after your meeting, yeah? Just get me from my office when you’re finished with the senator.”

“For sure,” Tony agreed, letting out an awkward laugh. James smiled and let go of Tony’s arm, before getting a devilish look in his eye and bringing Tony’s hand up to his lips. 

“See you later, babe.” 

“Yes, okay, goodbye James.” 

Tony whirled around and gestured for Steve to enter his office. 

“You two are—?” 

“Well, it’s actually none of your business, Rogers.” 

Steve bristled. “I was just wondering. I didn’t know Bucky worked here, is all. We knew each other for years and lost contact when our lives got, you know, lively.

“What did you want to meet for anyways? I think you said all you needed to in the press room.” 

“I’m here to find out what you’re going to say tonight.” 

Steve let out a breath. “Who told you?” 

“I have my sources. So, what are you planning?” 

A placid smile was all he got in return. “I think I’ll let you find out with the rest of the world, Tony. After all, as you said before, you reap what you sow. Well, that’s the correct form of the idiom anyways.”

He stood up and let out a small laugh. “I think you’ll find your bed made and ready to lie in.”

##### XXXIII.

“—and on that note, I’ll let you all enjoy dinner before heading to Senator Rogers’ press conference you all think I don’t know about. Dismissed, see you at nine A.M. sharp tomorrow.” 

The press laughed and started packing up, Jean heading to the side of the room and through the door. She walked to Tony’s office, giving his doorframe a courtesy knock before entering. 

“Get James and then meet everyone out front, we’re getting dinner before coming back to watch Rogers’ conference.” 

“Sure thing, jellybean,” Tony replied, setting down the file he had and grabbing his wallet, before standing up. 

“Thankful to have you back on press duty.” 

“It’s not an easy job,” Jean agreed. 

“And not one I’ll let people make fun of ever again. Because the press is brutal.” 

“To think, they were going easy on you.” 

“Your idea was brilliant, by the way.”

“What do you mean?” 

“Having the president’s speech happen in the city. It was captivating.”

“It was what she needed to do. You’ll have to commend Sam and Bruce on their own brilliance.” 

“That speech was something else,” Tony enthused, escorting Jean to the branched hallway. “I’ll see you guys soon— don’t leave without us.” 

“Only if you’re longer than fifteen minutes,” Jean promised, giving Tony an easy wink and laughing as he scrunched his nose in annoyance. 

He ignored her as an answer, bounding down the hallway at a perfectly reasonable gait, screw Jessica who wolf-whistled at him as he passed by her stakeout of the tertiary copy machine. 

“You wanna get dinner with me, Jean, Sam, and Bruce?” Tony asked in lieu of a greeting. 

“Well, it’s not the promised date, but I think I can manage,” James easily agreed, shutting down his computer and grabbing his coat. 

“I’ll pay for your meal,” Tony replied, hip checking the taller man as he passed by. 

“That’s something,” James conceded, grabbing Tony’s waist and bringing him in close. Tony felt his face heat up and cursed his Washington tan for showing the color so brightly. 

“We’re all going to watch Rogers’ conference after, so you’re invited for that as well. And then maybe we’ll get a drink.” 

James nodded and steered the both of them out of the office and down the hallway, arm still around Tony’s waist. “Sounds like a plan.” 

“And speaking of Rogers—“ he trailed off and their pace slowed as he thought out his next words, “how did— I never told you the specifics of the campaign.” He couldn’t really get out the rest and his words hung on equivocation. 

James pulled him closer for a second, before pulling away and taking Tony’s hand. “I don’t know the specifics, not really you’re right, but I’ve known _you_ awhile, and I’m pretty good at contextual clues.” 

“Oh. Well, thanks.” 

“For what?” 

Tony looked up at James’ face and smiled. “Nothing, never mind.” He leant up and brushed a kiss against his jaw. 

“Now let’s go eat before another national emergency strikes.” 

“Isn’t that, like, once an hour?” 

“That’s why I eat when I can.” 

“My boyfriend is so smart.”

“Mine is too sarcastic for his own damn good.” 

“He sounds great.” James wiggled his brow suggestively, making Tony snort as they caught up to the rest of the staff. 

“Let’s go, gang!” came the exclamation from Sam, and they started trudging through sleet underfoot, their voices carrying in the mid-evening slump of politicians, lobbyists, and tourists.

##### XXXIV.

“— this country deserves better, it needs better, and it will _be_ better, that I will promise every citizen of the country. It needs better, and it will be better—“

“No,” Tony whispered, heart pounding in his chest as he stared at the TV. 

“I can’t believe it,” Jean replied, looking over to Bruce and Sam, who were sitting, wide-eyed in disbelief. 

“I’m going to get the president,” Ororo decided, her determined footsteps retreating to no one acknowledging them. 

“What’s going on?” James asked, glancing around at the ashen faces around him. 

“Just watch,” Sam muttered, putting his hands to his mouth and clenching them around each other. 

Rogers took a breath and, giving a bright grin towards the cameras, continued. 

“The White House is lording itself over the democratic party and spitting in the face of healthy partisanship. A change needs to be made, and I believe that change needs to start from the top, down. The democratic party cannot nominate Diana Prince again in two and a half years if it wants to retain its unity.” 

Rogers took another breath, the air leaving Tony’s office where they were dreading what was to come. 

“That’s why I’m announcing my plan to run for the office of the President of the United States of America.”

The press erupted in a flurry of questions as Tony leaned, heavily and suddenly, against James side, forgetting how to breathe.


End file.
